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Monday, 3 November 2014

Quikr Se Quicker Aur Better?? ...not possible man!

In triumphantly joyful mood, I almost dangled around hubby's neck as he arrrived home that evening saying "hey, my joy knows no bound today...I've been shortlisted for Quikr's Free Shopping Fiesta by Blogadda, lets sit together to explore the exciting options and get some awesomeness for ourselves free of cost today..."

I just kept smiling until he stopped to take a deep breath and then told my smartie "dear, the opportunities like these come to only special people like me who are active members of blogging community on blogadda.com.... and you are mistaken with your pre-conceptions, so let me bring your across the reality check of Quikr.com."

To begin with my virtuous shopping experience, as soon as I decided to localize the search span to my city by typing in the search box provided, I found CHANDIGARH listed there on the top of POPULAR CITIES. The one single click on city name saved few precious fractions of my time in the very first step :D

Hubby dear was still not showing much interest in what I was doing and actually was expressing his restlessness by unlocking n locking his phone again n again.... but, I had left him with no choice other than to sit with me patiently ;)

I requested him politely to atleast glane at the neatly arranged catergories of products so that we could decide on the TYPE of items to look for. His abrupt answer was "agar kuch theek thaak condition me milta ho to dekh lo." From his answer I knew its my sole interest right now to decide what to buy. So I thought for few minutes and being a smart-homemaker, decided to go for some furniture items for our home.

I wanted to own sofa-cum-bed for one vacated corner of my big hall, so I clicked on Home - Office Furniture category http://chandigarh.quikr.com/Home-Office-Furniture/w320
The user-friendly interface popped up with number of filters in collapsed form on the left window pane. I was instantly impressed because the online websites that are designed carefully to minimize the time n effort invested by the shopper with these REFINE options are always my preferred ones, coz I go by the saying "Time is Money". Here I gave a THUMBS UP to Quikr!!

yeah! I chose sofa set as the sub-option in Furniture type being sold at SAS Nagar in Located In filter because its one of the less distant n more posh localities where I was expecting good quality items being sold. I ticked the USED checkbox as I knew that finding an UNUSED n BRAND NEW sofaset within designated budget of Rs 5000 won't be possible. I used the Price Slider Bar to customize my budget and dragged it to apprx. 5340/- as I thought to negotiate with the seller if I find something really appealing. I carelessly ignored the advertisements posted before one month or more and ticked off another option saying LAST 7 DAYS because the possibility of availability of items was higher for the recently uploaded ads.

I got mixed kindof result, like some items were too good and others were just of no use. The Save This Ad option came quite handy this time to make a list of items I was interested in, without saving their URLs in a separate document manually. :)

I could notice a bookmark type list being created automatically at the bottom right corner of the interfacefor future referene :)I was so engrossed in the site with complete attention & was so excited to buy the products, that not only I replied to the ads via REPLY TO button provided with the interface, but also opted for calling or SMSing the sellers to crack the deal quickersince all advertisements were accompanied with the contact number of seller.

I gave my hubby this duty of making calls to the sellers who posted their ads just 2-3 days agoto confirm the availability of their items and they all responded with "Sorry, it has been sold".I felt like heartbroken:(

I was convinced with his logic but sadly there were not many sofa sets suitable to our preferences and I didn't want to compromise in the quality of the product just because I was not paying for it :(

Now the ball was in hubby's court, and his interest had aroused in the whole shopping fiesta finally. He took my consent if we could buy something else as per our present household needs. We looked around ourselves to recollect what else can we buy which is something of great utility for our home.

The brainy boy immediately suggested to go for an Inverter Battery which was supposed to be replaced months ago, but the cash-crunch was the real culprit that our whole family was struggling in extreme discomfort managing without even turning a fan on during longggggggg power cuts in our rich state PUNJAB during scorching summer months because there wasn't enough power back up in our 4 yrs old battery :/ :(

A faded smile came and then vanished from my face... Again, I was skeptical on "how would we get to check the backup of a used battery?? The seller won't let us take the battery home to try n test. So how will you be checking its authenticity then?"

I breathed a sigh of relief that Quikr not only lists Individuals who are either buying or selling their old stuff, but also brings together the Dealers who deal in BRAND NEW/ UNUSED products in almost all possible categories :) :)

I gave the dealer a buzz telephonically and mentioned that i'm calling him in reference to his advertisement on Quikr. The person on the other end appeared to be quite focused. So I enquired him about the latest price of a 150 mAh invereter battery bacause the advertisement was posted in the month of August this year and there was a chance of price variation for sure. He quoted Rs. 8000 as the current price, but added that I must visit his shop at Sector 45, Chandigarh to look for available varieties in varying price ranges suitable to all budgets.

We fixed up the meeting at his shop the next morning as early as 10 a.m. that's when the market opens in my city here. As my hubby drove me to the given address, I scripted the imposing dialogues in my mind to negotiate with the seller ;) It took us around 30 mins to locate the address as the person was organized enough to give us the specific landmark and we didn't mind driving for a greater reward at all. Steeping down our car & standing in front of the shuttered down shop, we realized he was still on his way ;)

The seller's shop located at SCO53, Sec. 45 CHD

In next 15 mins or so, the owner of the shop Mr. Setia welcomed us as we exchanged greetings. I introduced myself as a member of Blogadda.com and elaborated to him about the Quikr Shopping Fiesta in the perspective of an advantageous promotional platform for sellers. He curiously asked me some questions regarding the campaign and I successfully dispelled all his doubts within moments. yeyyy !!

Me alongwith my hubby chose to buy the Luminous battery and exchanged our old, used battery for Rs. 3000 paying the net amount totalling Rs 5000, though the usual exchange price has been kept Rs 2500, but Mr. Setia had been kind enough to acknowledge Quikr.com as a great medium to publicise his products without spending a single penny, so he happily deducted additional Rs 500 :)

The product bill n warranty card being prepared.

As soon as we paid for the product, I knew its the right time to capture a pic each of the OLD and NEW batteries. (u may notice my reflection looking funny, clicking the pic standing on road as the old battery was being taken away and making people wonder what's so special about this battery) ;)

While collecting the Warranty Card for my new inverter battery, I prudently took the visting card of the seller for my readers of Chandigarh, if they ever need to buy branded electronics at Sec. 45 or nearby.

And now, beaming with a victorious countenance on my face, I expressed my gratitude to Mr. Setia for wonderful deal and a BIGGGG but silent THANKYOU from the core of my heart to team Blogadda for collaborating with Quikr for making this Diwali spread joy of festivity much brighter :) Goddess Laxmi never smiled at me like this ever before ... We had a gala time bringing home something of much usefulness <3

The inverter battery installed at my home for uminterrupted power backup now :)